Percentage of total emissions of pollutants to soil occurring in areas at water risk and/or of high-water stress
Unit
Indicator
Metric type
Framework alignment notes
Target example
[Company name] will reduce the total emissions of pollutants to soils occurring in areas at water risk and/or high water stress by [target amount, absolute or percentage] by [target year], compared with a [baseline year] baseline.
Target source: WBCSD target template
Metric assessment
Relevance: High
Feasibility: Low
Additional Metric Notes
ACT-D stage: Assess Maturity stage: Developing Metric Contribution to Action: Monitoring soil pollution in high-risk areas helps prevent contaminants from leaching into water systems and reduces environmental harm. It also enables targeted interventions that advance both site and catchment-level water stewardship toward best practices through continuous system improvement Observations/Successes/Challenges: > Are we tracking pesticides, heavy metals, microplastics, or organic contaminants? The metric needs clear pollutant definitions. > Defining “water risk” is complex as water risk varies by scale (local vs. basin-wide), seasonality, and user demand, making standardization difficult. > The same mass of pollutants (e.g., nitrates vs. heavy metals) can have different impacts on water quality, but this metric treats all emissions equally. > Finding new alternatives or phasing out pollutants, is also an option to reducing overal pollution. > Effective use and communication of this metric depend on multi-stakeholder engagement to ensure data veracity, contextual relevance, and collective progress toward risk and impact mitigation.